EMMA'S POV
The city woke in layers.
Emma noticed it every morning—the way sound arrived before light, the way motion preceded intention. Somewhere below her window, a delivery truck rumbled to a stop. Footsteps echoed in the alley. A door slammed. Life assembling itself piece by piece.
She stood at the kitchen counter with a mug of untouched coffee growing cold between her hands, eyes fixed on nothing in particular. The press conference from the day before still replayed behind her eyes, not as images but as sensations: the weight of attention, the electric hush before she spoke, the moment she realized she had crossed a threshold she could never step back over.
